VISTA WMC Stuck on Zap2it

Discuss Vista Media Center & XP Media Center Edition
mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#101

Post by mtreehugger » Sat Aug 29, 2015 1:01 pm

i just ran setup multiple times in multiple zip codes (that have been reported as recognized by Rovi) at a time when server usage should be low, and got the download failure every time. i actually first noticed the download error back in january, so i've been getting it since well before Zap2it went away. Now when I look at "provider credits" I no longer see Zap2it, so my WMC has no guide provider. (this happened earlier too--after my first trial of tv pack)

i also tried to install tv pack again, but this time got a message that said something to the effect of "the update does not apply to your system." apparently this is what vista tells us when we already have the update. it looks like the only way to uninstall is to go back via system restore (since i didn't make an image).

if i knew it would work i'd upgrade to win7. i'll wager that it won't work, though, so i'll keep my money, thank you.

lees40

Posts: 11
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 12:00 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#102

Post by lees40 » Sat Aug 29, 2015 1:55 pm

Well.... I found this instruction on another thread... and it worked, I now have guide data on my machine that I upgraded from Vista Home Premium to Windows 7 Home premium. What I did was:

Open up a command prompt, and change to the ehome directory. (I had media center up and running at the time as I had just unsuccessfully ran tv set up)

Run this command: mcupdate -uf -pscn 0

I now have the guide data for zipcode 18360 and my extender is working correctly!!!!

mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#103

Post by mtreehugger » Sat Aug 29, 2015 2:30 pm

Lees40, when i open a command prompt, it won't let me navigate to an ehome directory (explorer found two--lucky me!). the DOS mode won't recognize my AppData directory. Can you expound?

)do you have vista 32-bit home premium?)

User avatar
Vistaar

Posts: 141
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 3:11 pm
Location: United States

HTPC Specs: Show details

#104

Post by Vistaar » Sat Aug 29, 2015 4:04 pm

Lees40 had more to say in the "Media Center EPG Cutover" thread: http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... =93#p95598

My opinion? If users have to run elevated command prompts to set up Media Center, then Microsoft/Rovi have screwed things up royally. If you would like to know what worked for other TV Packers, read the first two pages of this thread. Virtually nothing of note has been written since page 2.

mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#105

Post by mtreehugger » Sat Aug 29, 2015 5:36 pm

You're just coming to the conclusion that MS/Rovi crapped all over us now? Most of what's been posted after page 2 has been by folks who tried suggestions on pages 1-2 that didn't work for them.

I have posted "feedback" as requested by folks who purport association with MS here: https://connect.microsoft.com/site1145/Feedback. Supposedly, MS and Rovi are reading and responding to these posts. I will report back if anything comes of it.

mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#106

Post by mtreehugger » Sun Aug 30, 2015 12:50 pm

I'm starting to wonder if my problems aren't due to my system being unable to process the TV Pack update, specifically that it somehow has rejected guide service altogether. After installing TV Pack (and PlayReady PC), my Media Center no longer points to either Zap2it or Rovi, i.e. there is no guide provider referenced anywhere that I can find. When I click through the setup menus to find my guide provider, there is no "about guide listings" option that I can click on, unlike what other users have reported. I do have "Data provider credits," but all that's listed here are Dolby and AMG.

Does anybody else have these same symptoms, or any ideas?

Thanks!

User avatar
Vistaar

Posts: 141
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 3:11 pm
Location: United States

HTPC Specs: Show details

#107

Post by Vistaar » Sun Aug 30, 2015 2:07 pm

mtreehugger wrote:When I click through the setup menus to find my guide provider, there is no "about guide listings" option that I can click on
On page 3, see my post #58 answer to your post #57 question. TV setup data download will fail until it doesn't. When it doesn't, you will have Rovi data.

User avatar
Vistaar

Posts: 141
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 3:11 pm
Location: United States

HTPC Specs: Show details

#108

Post by Vistaar » Sun Aug 30, 2015 3:21 pm

Microsoft has now recommended both flushdns and trying different ZIP codes: http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... =30&t=9179

BTW SteelWill stated that he had done both on page 2, post #23; so I would suggest that mtreehugger, tillerr and anyone else still struggling with this should take Microsoft's advice, even though it wasn't necessary in my particular case (just lucky I guess).

[Edit] Start > All Programs > Accessories, right-click Command Prompt and select Run as administrator (even if you are logged in as administrator). Type the following and then press Enter (note that there is a space before /): ipconfig /flushdns
Last edited by Vistaar on Sun Aug 30, 2015 3:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#109

Post by mtreehugger » Sun Aug 30, 2015 3:40 pm

[/quote]
Vistaar wrote:
mtreehugger wrote:When I click through the setup menus to find my guide provider, there is no "about guide listings" option that I can click on
On page 3, see my post #58 answer to your post #57 question. TV setup data download will fail until it doesn't. When it doesn't, you will have Rovi data.
Vistaar, thanks for all your efforts here! It must seem that you've been ignored, but if you look at post #62 you'll see that I heeded your advice to no avail. I've tried all of the ideas suggested in this thread at least once, some countless times, but nothing has worked. When I saw that I'd lost Norton (exactly when I can't say), then I tried system restore to get it back. That didn't work, so I then followed your tip to use the Norton uninstaller. I have my virus protection now, but everything I've re-tried since using system restore has behaved the same way that it did the first time around.

tillerr

Posts: 28
Joined: Fri May 18, 2012 2:51 pm
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#110

Post by tillerr » Sun Aug 30, 2015 6:27 pm

Vistaar wrote:Microsoft has now recommended both flushdns and trying different ZIP codes: http://www.thegreenbutton.tv/forums/vie ... =30&t=9179

BTW SteelWill stated that he had done both on page 2, post #23; so I would suggest that mtreehugger, tillerr and anyone else still struggling with this should take Microsoft's advice, even though it wasn't necessary in my particular case (just lucky I guess).

[Edit] Start > All Programs > Accessories, right-click Command Prompt and select Run as administrator (even if you are logged in as administrator). Type the following and then press Enter (note that there is a space before /): ipconfig /flushdns
Flush DNS trick gave me all my channels back as well as guide info. Thanks a ton! Now I just need to remember all the recordings I had set from last season so I don't miss any shows.

I'm also getting a decoder error when trying to watch live TV. I'll have to reboot and see if that fixes everything I guess.

User avatar
Vistaar

Posts: 141
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 3:11 pm
Location: United States

HTPC Specs: Show details

#111

Post by Vistaar » Sun Aug 30, 2015 8:07 pm

tillerr wrote:Flush DNS trick gave me all my channels back as well as guide info. Thanks a ton!
This thread needed some good news! It was actually getting rather depressing.
tillerr wrote:I'm also getting a decoder error when trying to watch live TV. I'll have to reboot and see if that fixes everything I guess.
Uh oh, that's a new one on me. If it doesn't go away, please post a screenshot of the error message (Vista has an accessory called Snipping Tool), or just type exactly what it says into Notepad and copy/paste it here.

tillerr

Posts: 28
Joined: Fri May 18, 2012 2:51 pm
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#112

Post by tillerr » Sun Aug 30, 2015 8:35 pm

Vistaar wrote:
tillerr wrote:Flush DNS trick gave me all my channels back as well as guide info. Thanks a ton!
This thread needed some good news! It was actually getting rather depressing.
tillerr wrote:I'm also getting a decoder error when trying to watch live TV. I'll have to reboot and see if that fixes everything I guess.
Uh oh, that's a new one on me. If it doesn't go away, please post a screenshot of the error message (Vista has an accessory called Snipping Tool), or just type exactly what it says into Notepad and copy/paste it here.
Haven't been able to make error page go away. I'll grab a screen shot very shortly. It basically says to restart WMC or the computer. I've tried both with no luck. I'm trying to figure out if I did something recently that would have removed the codecs WMC needs or possibly another is trying to take priority.

tillerr

Posts: 28
Joined: Fri May 18, 2012 2:51 pm
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#113

Post by tillerr » Sun Aug 30, 2015 9:00 pm

I ran the initial setup in WMC again Settings > General > Windows Media Center Setup > Run Setup Again and now I have live TV.

User avatar
Vistaar

Posts: 141
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 3:11 pm
Location: United States

HTPC Specs: Show details

#114

Post by Vistaar » Sun Aug 30, 2015 9:27 pm

Sounds good! You had me worried that something had gone wrong with your TV Pack installation, and I was on the brink of suggesting sfc /scannow. In case anyone might wonder, mine is clean:
Attachments
Vistaar sfc.JPG

mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#115

Post by mtreehugger » Sun Aug 30, 2015 10:21 pm

Well, at the risk of being depressing, the dns flush trick didn't work for me. DOS told me that it flushed okay, but that's where the success ended. I tried running WMC setup immediately, and I tried running it after another flush and a reboot, and either way I'm still getting the guide error. Are there some other steps that need to be taken in conjunction with flush dns?

I also tried lees40's trick via elevated cmd prompt in both of my ehome directories but the command was rejected as unrecognizable or some such.

One other possible clue is starting to click with me, and that is the 2nd screen that pops up after the download failure--it attributes the failure to earlier failed attempts or something like that. Now that I think about it, I don't recall seeing this screen previous to TV pack. It's almost like it's telling me something needs to be cleaned out, but what?

lees40

Posts: 11
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 12:00 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#116

Post by lees40 » Mon Aug 31, 2015 12:01 am

mtreehugger wrote:Lees40, when i open a command prompt, it won't let me navigate to an ehome directory (explorer found two--lucky me!). the DOS mode won't recognize my AppData directory. Can you expound?

)do you have vista 32-bit home premium?)
No i upgraded from vista home premium to windows 7 home premium then did the two steps i mentioned

tillerr

Posts: 28
Joined: Fri May 18, 2012 2:51 pm
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#117

Post by tillerr » Mon Aug 31, 2015 12:20 pm

mtreehugger wrote:Well, at the risk of being depressing, the dns flush trick didn't work for me. DOS told me that it flushed okay, but that's where the success ended. I tried running WMC setup immediately, and I tried running it after another flush and a reboot, and either way I'm still getting the guide error. Are there some other steps that need to be taken in conjunction with flush dns?

I also tried lees40's trick via elevated cmd prompt in both of my ehome directories but the command was rejected as unrecognizable or some such.

One other possible clue is starting to click with me, and that is the 2nd screen that pops up after the download failure--it attributes the failure to earlier failed attempts or something like that. Now that I think about it, I don't recall seeing this screen previous to TV pack. It's almost like it's telling me something needs to be cleaned out, but what?
mtreehugger, I too was getting the "earlier failed attempts" notice after the download failure popped up. Your situation sounds almost identical to mine other than the fact that the dns flush and a fresh WMC setup didn't fix your problems. Keep trying and reporting back here so I or someone else can help you. I know how frustrating this is and also how much relief I felt when it was finally fixed.

tillerr

Posts: 28
Joined: Fri May 18, 2012 2:51 pm
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#118

Post by tillerr » Mon Aug 31, 2015 1:04 pm

It's back.
Attachments
Capture.JPG

mtreehugger

Posts: 49
Joined: Tue Aug 04, 2015 2:04 am
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#119

Post by mtreehugger » Mon Aug 31, 2015 2:05 pm

tillerr wrote:It's back.
tillerr, that ties in somewhat with your TV tuner, correct? Which tuner do you have? (because if it's the same one I have, Hauppauge, then I give up on getting my guide up and running)

tillerr

Posts: 28
Joined: Fri May 18, 2012 2:51 pm
Location:

HTPC Specs: Show details

#120

Post by tillerr » Mon Aug 31, 2015 2:14 pm

mtreehugger wrote:
tillerr wrote:It's back.
tillerr, that ties in somewhat with your TV tuner, correct? Which tuner do you have? (because if it's the same one I have, Hauppauge, then I give up on getting my guide up and running)
I'm not at home now but pretty sure it's an ATI TV Wonder USB tuner.

Post Reply